


change your number, burn your outfit

by ghostwit



Category: One Piece
Genre: Alternate Canon, Because I'm pretty sure the implication is we saw their parting but. It hurt me so., Canon divergent but it's really just a smidge. It doesn't affect anythi., Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Multi, Pre-Canon, Really loosely ig., a little not-goodbye before Roger turns 'imself in.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-14
Updated: 2020-09-14
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:16:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25885705
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostwit/pseuds/ghostwit
Summary: Sabaody is a good enough place to wait.(Or, Roger can't resist one more parting.)
Relationships: Gol D. Roger/Portgas D. Rouge (implied), Gol D. Roger/Silvers Rayleigh, Suuuper vague implication of Portgas D. Rouge/Silvers Rayleigh(/Gol D. Roger)
Comments: 9
Kudos: 20





	change your number, burn your outfit

**Author's Note:**

> Ye.s I'm bitter he saw Newgate after he'd already said his goodbyes to Rayleigh.

The sun is rising and the grass of Sabaody is slick and tacky and dries in Rayleigh's hair so it crackles against his ears. 

His eyes are closed, but he knows whose shadow he lays in--has stood in--as the sun blips out behind his closed eyelids, a different kind of warmth sheltering him. "Roger," he says, and he's crying even before the word is out, choking messily and keeping his eyes squeezed shut; he's torn, wants to see him, memorize every crease in his grin like he hasn't already a million times over, but he knows how dreams work. If he opens his eyes it’ll be over. 

He smells like Baterilla when he loops those clumsy fingers around Rayleigh's outstretched wrist to pull him up and into a crushing embrace, Rayleigh can almost feel the hibiscus petals tucked behind Roger's ear brushing against his face--it'd be a nice blush, he thinks, knowing Rouge. He tastes like Baterilla, too, when he reaches up to tilt Rayleigh's chin into his own with a commanding ease, kiss him until Rayleigh has the sense to reach behind Roger and slide palms up the length of his back before winding into his hair. There's a twist of jealousy there, just the barest hint he's been unable to rid himself of before he realizes, with a squeeze somewhere in his wracked lungs, that, _oh,_ he's _here_ and he's here for _me._ Too, in the basest parts of him where that jealousy resides, is his love for Rouge, competing and winning even in their years apart. 

He stops, breathes in in one low, wet rattle, holds Roger's forehead against his own as he parts their lips. _Stay close for just a little bit more._ He opens his eyes. 

("Take me with you, captain." He swallows, because Roger's not crying, Roger's not looking up at him with longing eyes digging his nails into his scalp like he'll slip through his arms like mist if he doesn't run rivulets of blood through that dark hair--) 

Rayleigh kisses him this time, pushes forward with so much force that Roger curves his spine even despite the height difference, slips his arms around Rayleigh's waist as he leans back to lift the man off the ground, laughs against his mouth. Warm and breathless with ill-concealed desperation, like Rayleigh's carving a space beyond his throat to pull himself into, shredding Roger's lungs just to smile in that half-polite half-sleazy way of his and decline for sake of the other man's convenience. It hurts, Roger knew it would, but his resolve runs past his veins, bedrock deep--this part, they both know. 

Rayleigh bares his throat when he pulls away this time, lets the smooth vibration of his laugh rattle through the both of them as he runs soothing nails through Roger's hairline. Roger hums for a moment, awed at the way the sunlight filters pure white through Rayleigh's hair as it flutters around his head, the way his laugh rings clear and tinkling even as he fights an ugly sob, his Rayleigh always so neat and controlled. 

Not to be outdone, he dives back in, tackling his former first mate to the ground in another bruising kiss. “It’s wonderful, Rayleigh.” he says, rolling into Rayleigh’s palms as they slide again, down his neck and under that thick captain’s coat of his, aching for skin-to-skin. 

Maybe, hunched in the cabin with his knees glancing Erio’s as they pored over a nautical chart, a hand on his shoulder and another in his own as he’s tugged onto Laughtale’s glittering shore, maybe when he’d fell to his knees with a hand braced on Gaban’s back to steady them as they wheezed themselves breathless. Maybe then, it had been wonderful, the frayed edge to each hacking cough of Roger’s distant and cool, like a poetic end with quiet voices and bedside kisses. When the world had been deceptively simple--he’d dug his hands beneath the rippling scales of the Tenryuubito, felt the paltry steel of the Marine’s guns, and still found Roger, undeniable Roger beneath. The illusion of peace, the barest kiss of hope in which standing atop the world was a calloused thumb tucking against the back of his palms, easier than breathing.

It _had_ been wonderful. Had. _Had._ Each thought another nail through the ears. It’s all he can do to not pull Roger against his chest, scream himself hoarse with every obscenity woven in his sailor’s skin. _Why does it have to happen like this?_

_Don’t leave me. I couldn’t stand it._

Still, Roger is here, all warm weight pinning Rayleigh to the grass, the salt of his upper brow smeared into Rayleigh's skin and his laughter, a deep-bellied _wa ha ha,_ jostling them in tandem. Pulling into something beyond hope--beyond prayer when all his faith is right before him--he asks that this be enough. The end that's been chasing them, the decisive thunk of a leather tome flipping shut. Let this final page, the only thing left unfinished, be enough.

“I want you to live,” Roger says, hands braced on Rayleigh’s shoulders, grin unfaltering even as Rayleigh can feel his bones splintering into cold shards beneath his skin with the next sharp intake of breath. Another kiss, to the corner of his mouth, an apology for when he causes a scene, starts an inconvenient fight, but this is perhaps the heaviest inconvenience he’s laid on Rayleigh so far, and so he lingers, breathing the next words into his skin. 

“I’m not going to die, partner.” 

(Dutifully, Rayleigh stands and lets Roger make the leap into the lion’s maw of Marineford--if such a pitiful organization can be compared to such a noble beast--laughing as Rayleigh can feel the gnash of teeth unknitting his ribs, tearing him open with the urge to _follow, follow, follow._

Taking after his captain, he defies nature. Denies the frantic firing in all his nerves, and stays, doesn’t offer a final hand, never utters that _please_. And so, mutually, they turn their backs.) 

**Author's Note:**

> Ummm pee pee poo poo . I want to rewrite this eventually but like. At least I did it! No thoughts, just sad middle aged men (or one sad middle aged man and one absolutely incomprehensible one). Anyway, hey, did you notice that Rayleigh's not looking as Roger's walking away--not letting his captain turn his back on him. because they're partners . you kn . lol . lol. panels that live in my head rent free. 
> 
> Please leave a comment if you're up for it, they mean the world to me. 
> 
> hazeism.tumblr.com
> 
> EDIT: AO3 TRIED TO EAT THIS SO SORRY IF YOU'RE SUBSCRIBED (all 16 of you <3) AND GET DOUBLE EMAIL-ED ADHGHJ.


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